John Lescroart - Damage

With her network of informers at the Hall of Justice, by last Monday morning she’d discovered that Ro Curtlee had in fact not murdered Janice Durbin. And for her it was but a short and seemingly logical extrapolation to conclude that he’d had nothing to do with the other murders either.

Now she was in the middle of her Friday column, in which she was well on the way to characterizing the murderous actions of Linda Salcedo at the Curtlee mansion as the work of a low-intelligence, disgruntled domestic employee. It was shaping up to be the kind of emotional broadside she was best at, and she was wrestling with her prose when suddenly the door to her office opened and a man came in like a blast of angry wind.

Who let this man in? What was going on in the front office that he hadn’t been stopped?

Standing up, whirling to face him, her hands went to the phone to call security and her eyes flashed in fury over the invasion of her privacy. “What the hell…” But in the next second, she recognized him. She replaced the phone’s headpiece and leaned forward over her desk, her weight on her hands and arms. “You’re Michael Durbin.”

“That’s right.” Durbin wore jeans and a windbreaker and carried a large cloth book bag from the San Francisco Mystery Bookstore over his shoulders. “How are you doing this morning?”

“I’m fine,” she said, “but as you can see, I’m in the middle of a column. Normally I don’t take appointments until my column’s done for the day.” Heads are going to roll over this, Marrenas was thinking. Whoever let this clown into the building. Forcing on a patient smile, she said, “But since you’re already here, I can probably spare a couple of minutes. What can I do for you? Do you want to take a seat?”

“That would be nice, thanks.” He pulled around the cafeteria chair from the side of her desk.

When he’d gotten seated, Marrenas sat back down, too. “Well?”

Durbin pursed his lips, took in a breath. “Well, Sheila-do you mind if I call you Sheila?-I noticed that the past few days you’ve been going out of your way to clear the name of Ro Curtlee, bringing out all the facts of the police investigation and so on.”

“Right. That’s what I…”

Durbin held up a hand, stopping her. “I’m very familiar with what you do, Sheila, as you know. More familiar than most. What I’m down here for today is to tell you about the damage you do, to let you know how close you came to destroying me and my family, and to let you know that we’ve come out of it stronger and better.”

“Well, I’m glad to see…”

Durbin stopped her again. “Please. You and your poisonous column came a long way toward convincing my boy Jon that his father was capable of murdering his mother.”

Marrenas shifted her gaze. “I’m very sorry about that. I was going on the facts as I knew them at the time. For the record, I didn’t print anything that was factually wrong, so if you’re entertaining a lawsuit, forget about it.”

“I’m sure that’s how you justify your hatchet jobs to yourself. Select the facts you need for your own purposes, ignore context, and avoid responsibility.”

Marrenas huffed in self-righteousness. “I’m not an irresponsible journalist, Mr. Durbin. I’m an investigative reporter.” She gestured to the walls around her office, the plaques for her awards and achievements. “They don’t give these things out in Cracker Jack boxes, you know.”

“No, I’m sure they don’t. But let me give you a couple of facts. Feel free to take notes if you want. First, of course, the most important fact-I didn’t kill my wife. Second, I love my children. Third, since I didn’t kill Janice, the alleged affair that I had with my good friend Liza Sato could not have been the motive for that murder, now, could it? And as for her sticking up for me at our workplace, that was the simple loyalty of a friend, not an example of collusion to help me with a cover-up. Are you getting all this?”

Marrenas gave him a dismissive shrug.

Durbin went on, “Finally, here’s some excellent news about my plans for the future. I’m going to take Janice’s life insurance and enough from the fire to build a new house. I’m going to resurrect my career as a painter, the career you helped destroy for me ten years ago. How does that sound to you?”

“Good,” Marrenas said, her eyes frankly nervous now, flitting back and forth between Durbin and the door behind him. “That sounds good. I’m very glad to see that things will work out for you. But I really have to insist you leave now.”

Durbin shifted his weight in his chair. “Fine, but I want you to know that I’ll still have enough cash left over so that if I ever see my name in your column again, I’m going to pay someone to hunt you down and kill you like the vermin you are.”

Staggered by the verbal assault, she could do nothing but stare at him.

“Unless, of course,” Durbin said, “I don’t think you’re taking me seriously. In which case, maybe I’ll just do it myself right now.”

Durbin reached into his book bag and brought out a small handgun.

Marrenas’s eyes went wide with panic. She put her hands out in front of her. “Oh my God, don’t. No, please. Oh God, I just peed my pants. I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to hurt anyone. I was just trying to do the best job I could. Please. Please, don’t…”

Durbin allowed himself a small, tight smile. “Good,” he said. “I appear to have your undivided attention. I’m going to quote a famous line from The Graduate , Sheila. You ready for it? ‘Plastics.’ ” He reached out and placed the toy gun on the front edge of her desk. “Keep it as a souvenir to remember me by,” he said. “And don’t even think about calling the police. After all, what harm could I have done with a plastic gun? And I can practically guarantee that they might just agree with the position you took in your column on Ro Curtlee-that threatening people really isn’t a big deal. But never forget what I told you. If my name ever appears in your column again, I will have you killed. Now”-he smiled at her-“have yourself a nice day.”

Frannie Hardy came back into their house on Sunday morning just as her husband, Dismas, was sitting down to the hash and egg breakfast he’d cooked up in the ten-pound cast-iron pan he kept hanging from a marlin hook over their stove. “Where have you been?” he asked her. “I was thinking about getting worried.”

“That’s what I love about you,” she said. “That ‘almost worried’ quality.”

“I’m pacing myself,” Hardy said. “You don’t want to get too worked up and worry unnecessarily.” He pointed down at his plate. “You want some of this? I’ve got plenty.”

“No. You go ahead.” She sat down across from him.

“Where were you anyway?” he asked. “And don’t say something impossible like the Galápagos Islands or the Ukraine or someplace.”

She said, “I went to church.”

“I told you, no kidding around.”

“I’m not kidding. I went to church. I could even tell you the specific one if you want.”

Hardy put down his fork and looked across at her. “Not that it’s not a fine thing to do, especially here on a Sunday morning and all, but now I am a little worried. Is everything all right?”

“Everything’s fine. Us, health, kids, all good.”

“But…?”

“But remember the other night when you and Abe were sitting here doing the postmortem on all this madness with Ro Curtlee? And he was telling you how it had all begun this time around with the burning death of this poor woman Felicia Nuñez, who’d evidently been one of his first victims, too?”